"Colorado is often lauded for its incredibly healthy residents, credited to the abundance of outdoor recreation available to locals and tourists alike. Yet according to a recent real estate study, the nation’s most polluted zip code – 80216 – can also be found in the centennial state’s capital city...

...Steps from I-70, a massive highway that physically disenfranchises this already disadvantaged community from the rest of downtown, sits The GrowHaus. This former cut flower processing plant and greenhouse sat empty for years until local restaurateur Paul Tamburello and activist Ashara Ekundayo reimagined its future. “At the beginning, all we had was a vacant building, an interesting idea and a team of three white guys who didn’t speak Spanish,” remembers Executive Director Coby Gould. That idea was to transform the abandoned greenhouse into a resource to combat the community’s food access struggles."